


sl1 k2tog psso

by carleton97



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-15
Updated: 2009-12-15
Packaged: 2017-10-13 04:12:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/132696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carleton97/pseuds/carleton97
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>sl1 k2tog psso - a knitting stitch wherein three stitches become one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sl1 k2tog psso

**Wednesday shop hours: 10-6  
4pm - 6pm: men's stitch & bitch**

"So Bob, what are you doing on Saturday?"

Bob looked up at Mikey from where he was sorting the handmade stitch markers Gerard made for him when he was bored behind the counter at the comic shop. "Working."

The _duh_ was implicit in his tone.

Mikey rolled his eyes. "Get Patty or Kathleen to watch the store for you. We need to make use of your manly strength, Robert."

Bob twitched back from Mikey's grabby fingers. "Keep your creepy spider fingers off me."

"You love his creepy spider fingers." Ray had to duck the ball of paper Bob tossed at him, then swore when he dropped the hank of yarn he was trying to get on the swift.

Mikey went back to sewing buttons onto his latest set of arm warmers. "But really, we need your help."

"What's going on?"

"You know the empty storefront between Ray's and the bar?"

"Yeah?"

"Alicia and Lyn and a friend of theirs from college got approved for a small business loan and are moving in this weekend."

"That's awesome!" Bob loved the little neighborhood that was slowly developing around Miss KittyKat's Ball of Yarn. When he'd inherited the shop five years ago, the whole area had been a bit of a wasteland, but Bob liked to think the endless hours he'd spent organizing his store and keeping it in the black had played a part in the urban renewal that was now well under way.

"Yeah, but Ray and Christa are visiting her parents this weekend so that just leaves me and Gerard to help."

Gerard finally checked into the conversation when he caught his name. "Wait, what?"

"I'm just trying to convince Bob to help us on Saturday. Go back to your Tauntaun."

"It's a T-Rex. I finished the Tauntaun yesterday." Gerard held up the half-finished figure he was crocheting. "It looks like a T-Rex, right?"

"It's fucking sweet, G." Ray had finished untangling his yarn and was balling it up.

"I was thinking about adding some wings and making it a Godzilla/Mothra hybrid."

"Knitted wings?" Bob cocked his head, trying to imagine that.

"No, no. I was thinking about using wire and beads." Gerard tried to gesture, but just ended up knocking his ball of yarn onto the floor and swearing as it rolled all the way across the shop. "Fuck."

Mikey ignored his brother scampering across the middle of the room. "So, Saturday?"

"Yes, fine." Bob knew Patty would be happy to watch the shop for a few hours. "What kind of place are they opening, anyway?"

He shouldn't have asked, he realized that the second Mikey's face twisted up into a seriously disturbing grin.

"A classy, female positive sex shop."

"Oh, for fuck's sake."

Gerard narrowed his eyes from where he was kneeling with his arm half under a shelf, "Do you have something to say about our society's continued sexual subjugation of women, Bob?"

Bob huffed out a sigh. "No. I just don't want to have to explain to Patty why a mannequin is wearing a harness rig, that's all."

Gerard opened his mouth to respond, then made a face and conceded the point with a shudder. "I'll talk to Lyn about window displays."

"Thank you."

***

Despite the rather daunting forecast of rain and cold for the April morning, Saturday was sunny and mild when Bob parked next to Gerard's ridiculous muscle car. The windows to the storefront were newly cleaned and sparkling in the reflected sunlight and a freshly painted sign reading "With Bells On" was swinging gently in the spring breeze. The door was propped open with an empty flowerpot and Bob thought everyone had already jumped ship already to get coffee from Jepha's Tea Room when he heard a metallic crash followed by, "Motherfucking shitbag piece of junk!"

"Hello?" Bob stuck his head inside the door just in time to see a smallish, dark haired woman kick at a rusty set of metallic shelves.

She startled at the sound of his voice, pressing her hand to her chest for a moment before flushing pink and trying to push the battered shelving behind her with her foot. "Um, hi. We're not exactly open yet."

He smiled, helplessly charmed, and sent an obvious glance around the completely empty and dusty space. "Yeah, no. I'm Bob. Mikey asked me to help?"

"Right! God, sorry." She stepped forward and held out her hand. "I'm Jamia." She had dark, chin-length hair, big brown eyes, and a look to her that Joanne might have described as "spunky." Trouble, in other words. Bob tried not to be too obvious about checking her out, glancing down quickly to notice beat-up Docs worn under faded jeans and a short, flowered sundress. And really, really amazing cleavage. Bob jerked his eyes back up to her face and caught a look of mischievous amusement in her eyes. If she'd noticed him checking out her boobs, she didn't say anything about it.

"Nice to meet you." Her hand was small and soft in Bob's and his touch lingered a fraction of a second too long.

She didn't call him on it, though, just grinned and flicked her eyes over him in a quick, fairly subtle once over. "I have to say, from Mikey's description, I was expecting someone bigger."

Bob opened his mouth to respond, but wasn't quite sure what to say. _Thanks_ wasn't quite right, _Did Mikey call me fat?_ was a little too insecure for a first meeting, and _What the fuck?_ was way more abrupt that he wanted to be. Before he could decide what to say, Jamia's eyes' widened and she hesitantly settled her hand on his arm just about his elbow.

"That came out totally wrong. It's just the way Mikey talks makes you seem larger than life. And Gerard has all these sketches of you as, like, a Viking raider."

"Don't worry about it." He sighed; he'd seen some of those sketches, dammit. He covered her hand with his and gave it a little squeeze. "So what are we doing today?"

Jamia smiled like the sun coming up and made a wide gesture. "Getting rid of all the crap left in here, scrubbing everything down, and getting the new shelves up."

The rusty shelves she'd been beating up when he first walked in were the only bit of wreckage in the room, but Bob could see a tangled mess of junk through the door to the back room. "How much stuff is back there?"

She made a face. "I'm not sure. The possibility of spiders and/or mice has kept me up here."

"Knowing the others, I guess that means Lyn and I will be cleaning out the back?"

"Probably?" Her mouth twisted into a pout that made it really hard for Bob to even think about denying her anything.

He huffed out a laugh at himself and gestured to the metal frame on the ground. "Let's toss this back there and start cleaning. It'll take those jokers forever to get coffee."

"Awesome." Jamia picked up her end of the shelf and helped heave it into the back stockroom. "I've got all of these environmentally friendly cleaning products my boyfriend recommended, but I'm not sure how well they're going to work."

Boyfriend.

Well, shit.

 _Of course_ she already had a boyfriend.

Bob took off his jacket and turned to toss it onto the counter to give his smile a moment to untwist itself. "Let's get to it, then."

***

 **Thursday shop hours: 10-6  
6pm - whenever: invite-only stitch & bitch**

"Please tell me you're not cheating on me."

Bob winced at the silence that descended on the little group gathered after hours in the shop. He, perhaps, could have worded that better if the look on Gerard's face was anything to go by. Confessing his totally ill-advised crush to Gerard had definitely been a mistake. He pointed to the ball of yarn Jamia had tucked between her leg and the arm of the chair. "You did not buy that here."

"Oh." Jamia actually stopped knitting in the middle of her stitch. "Frank sent it to me last week. He found it somewhere in Seattle, I think."

Bob leaned over to brush his fingers over the ball, making a face at how scratchy it was. "What is that? Straw?"

Jamia ran the length of working yarn through her hand and grimaced. "It's vegan?"

"Oh my fucking god." Bob could actually feel his blood pressure begin to creep up. "How many times am I going to have to defend wool to some vegan asshole? Not every farm is the gateway to a slaughterhouse. I actually do a little research before buying yarn, you know?"

"I know, I know." Jamia patted his leg, a fraction of an inch too high to be purely platonic, dammit. Shit like that was the reason Bob couldn't rid himself of his stupid high school crush. "I've tried to tell him, but I think he's just being a dick for fun at this point."

"It's not like I'm out there clubbing baby seals. I'm just trying to sell some yarn." Bob shifted just enough to get Jamia's hand off his leg before he said something that he'd regret about what he thought about her dicksmack rockstar boyfriend. Jamia'd been in town for almost three months and the asshole had only visited a couple of times -- just a few of days here and there where Jamia would disappear for about forty-eight hours and reappear looking glowing and relaxed. Bob was pretty sure after helping Jamia re-tile her bathroom, he'd seen more of their new house that the mysterious Frank had. He was so _stupid_ sometimes.

Ray didn't even bother to look up from the subtle basketweave scarf he was working on. "Yeah, you made that pretty clear to that PETA girl last week."

"I apologized to her." Bob could feel himself flushing red at the memory of _that_ afternoon. He'd maybe gotten a little heated with the sanctimonious teenager he caught trying to smear paint over his racks of Koigu. He probably hadn't needed to make her cry, but Koigu was fucking expensive and he really had no patience for bullshit like that.

"Telling her lamb was delicious was probably overkill." Mikey grinned in obvious relish at the memory.

"All of you can shut the fuck up, okay?" Bob glanced down at the octopus hat he was trying to chart for Gerard and Lyn's baby. The kitty cat hat and paw mittens had been a snap, but the tentacles were proving to be a bit problematic. "And it's not like I was lying or anything. Lamb is delicious."

Jamia snatched the chart out of his hands and grinned at him when she saw what he was trying to do. "You're delicious, Bryar. You big softie."

"I thought I told you to shut up." He leaned his chair back on two legs and reached behind the shelf to hide the stupid, traitorous blush that would not go away. He grabbed the bag of buffalo blend he'd set aside for her. "Anyway, put that weedy shit down."

She caught the bag he tossed at her and almost immediately threw it back at him. "Oh, hell no."

"What?" Bob threw it back and pointed at her to keep it on her lap.

"Bob! That is six hundred dollars worth of yarn!" Jamia looked torn between smacking him and tearing the bag open to touch the sinfully soft yarn.

"And I need a sample garment knitted up for the display."

Jamia narrowed her eyes at him and Bob manfully ignored the disbelieving cough Alicia gave. He'd hung up the sample alpaca shawl she'd knitted last year for about a month before he'd replaced it with a simple stockinette swatch and given her the shawl.

It was his way.

And if the buffalo happened to be Jamia's favorite color, well, that couldn't be helped.

God, he was an idiot.

Jamia pulled a corner of the bag open, but resisted touching its contents. "Speaking of Frank, there's a week break between this leg of their tour and the next so he's going to be home starting August 12th. He's looking forward to meeting you, Bob."

Bob had never been much of an actor, so he wasn't exactly sure what sort of expression was on his face when he said, "Oh, man. I'm flying out for my Mom's birthday on the 10th. That totally sucks," but it must have been enough to convince everyone he was sincere.

"You're closing the shop for a whole week?"

Bob laughed at Gerard's question. "Even if I tried, Patty and the rest of them would open it the second I was gone."

Gerard nodded and looked over his shoulder as if Patty Carson and her posse of elderly compatriots were lurking behind the superwash shelves. "They do love the shop quite a bit."

"They kept if afloat after Aunt Rosemarie died and when I first took over, so they can pretty much do whatever the hell they want." Bob knew some people would be resentful about the half a dozen women who considered Miss KittyKat's Ball of Yarn and everything related to it as their personal domain, but once he'd decided to keep the shop, their input had been priceless.

"You really are a big softie, aren't you?"

"Shut up and finish crocheting your Cthulhu, Gerard."

***

 **Friday shop hours: 10-6  
all day long: ask a knitter**

Bob knew better than to stereotype knitters--his Wednesday night Men's Stitch & Bitch was a perfect example of the scope of crafting diversity--but 99% of his clientele fell into one of two categories: old women and young women. It wasn't good or bad, but it was a pretty big adjustment from the testosterone-heavy world of clubs and touring musicians he thought he'd be dealing with as his career.

Being surrounded by grandmas and soccer moms and teenage girls talking about -- Jesus Christ -- _Twilight_ was always going to be weird and it certainly wasn't what he expected to be doing with his life, but the shop was _his_ in a way that running sound in a shitty club could never be. By now, Bob had grown so accustomed to being surrounded by women that he was always taken aback whenever a man wandered into the shop.

Especially one as hot as the tiny guy poking at the piles of orange and black yarn Bob had displayed for Halloween.

Bob just stared for a few minutes. Tiny Hotass was wearing a faded black tee-shirt with some kind of monster movie poster on it, skin-tight ripped jeans that had probably once been black, and old low-top chucks. His arms were covered in tattoos, and Bob could swear he caught the glint of a lip-ring as the guy turned his head. He looked vaguely familiar, but Bob couldn't place him no matter how hard he tried.

"Take a picture, it'll last longer," the guy said. He didn't sound hostile, just matter-of-fact. Bob coughed, embarrassed at being caught staring.

"Can I help you with anything?" Bob fucking loved having the solicitous retail thing to fall back on sometimes.

The only response he got was a quick leer and a quicker grin. "Are you a knitter?"

"Yeah." Bob let his answer stretch out a little, completely unsure where the guy was going with this.

He pointed to the large sign displaying the shop's weekly schedule behind the counter. "Does that mean I can ask you anything I want?"

"Maggie is officially on duty today, but sure," Bob said, realizing too late that maybe he should have clarified that only covered crafts. Tiny Hotass seemed like the type of guy who would ask something crazy just to embarrass the hell out of him.

The guy's eyes lit up like he'd been handed all of his dreams and Bob knew disaster was imminent. Tiny Hotass opened his mouth and promptly closed it again when Sylvia bustled out of the stockroom, yelling at one of the wholesalers on the bluetooth her grandson had set up for her.

"About knitting." Bob raised his eyebrows at the pout that got and graciously added, "Or crochet."

"You're no fun."

"Oh, I'm plenty of fun." And that came out way dirtier than Bob had intended, but the guy was hot and funny and _not_ Jamia.

"What if what I needed advice on was how to knit a dildo cozy?"

Bob blinked at Tiny Hotass, who batted his eyelashes at him innocently. "A dildo cozy."

"Yep. Something in green, or blue. Purple is just too obvious." He managed to sound completely serious until almost the very end, when he started giggling a little.

"I don't have anything specifically for that, but I do have lots of patterns for kid size tube socks."

It took every bit of Bob's willpower to keep a straight face as Tiny Hotass blinked at him, obviously trying to decide exactly how to take that. He finally shook his head and laughed. "What's your name, dude? You're awesome."

Bob smiled. "I'm Bob."

"Hey, Bob, I'm -- "

"Frank!"

Bob turned his head at Jamia's shout, but almost missed her as she shot across the shop right into the arms of Tiny Hotass.

Frank.

Of course.

Because the universe hated Bob, tiny-hotass-Frank and Jamia started making out as if they hadn't seen each other in months. Which, as far as he knew was actually the case, but still, it was further proof that the universe had it in for Bob.

Bob backed away awkwardly, trying not to notice that Jamia had a leg hitched up around Frank's waist, or that Frank was pushing Jamia back against the display of fun fur. Except that Frank was clearly not aware of the fact that that display wasn't actually anchored to anything, and it was about to tip over. Bob leaped forward to try to catch it, and managed to land in a heap with both Frank and Jamia underneath him.

Bob shifted just enough to stop the sharp edge of the destroyed display from digging into his ribs and dropped his head down on to the ground between Frank and Jamia. He knew he only had about five seconds before Jamia started -- and there she went -- laughing so hard she she ended up snorting. Frank was laughing before she even finished her first round of giggles and Bob rolled off the two of them before he completely embarrassed himself.

Sylvia peeking at them from over the top of the counter prompted another round of laughter, but once that wound down, Jamia pushed herself upright and smiled down at Bob. "Come on, we're all going to get pizza."

Oh _hell_ no. "I can't. I -"

"No excuses, Bryar. Frank's home for the next few months and we're all going to get pizza." Jamia had on her no-nonsense-face. The same one that had Bob attending the monthly "information sessions" at With Bells On with the minimum of complaints and the absolute maximum blushing. Bob now knew more about sex-slings, bondage, and strap-ons than he ever thought possible.

He really regretted there was no such thing as brain bleach.

Frank rolled up to his knees and dropped an absentminded kiss on Jamia's shoulder. "Come on, Bob. She's too much woman for just me to handle."

Bob sighed and let the two of them pull him to his feet and bully him out the door.

The universe totally hated him.

***

 **Saturday shop hours: 10-6  
1pm - 3pm: kid's instruction**

Frank was a vegetarian going through a vegan phase which made going out for pizza with him an adventure, Bob learned over the next couple of weeks. Bob wasn't exactly a meatitarian, but pizza without sausage or even cheese was a fucking sacrilege. Jamia was very obviously used to Frank's dietary foibles and indulged his whacked out topping combinations.

But she always stole a piece of Bob's pie when Frank went to the bathroom.

Bob wasn't sure how he'd gotten roped into going out with Jamia and Frank every couple of nights--sometimes for pizza, sometimes to watch shitty little punk bands in clubs that were about the size of his mom's basement--but he was rapidly becoming used to their company. He figured that he should probably feel like a fifth wheel, but he really didn't. Hanging out with Jamia and Frank was the most fun he'd had in ages. Frank had weird taste in pizza and wrote angry lyrics about high school. Jamia knew a disturbing amount of trivia about sex toys and made costumes for Alicia and Mikey's freakshow cat. They were both funny and bitchy and the hottest people in any given room. Bob was sinking fast, and he knew it.

Jamia had just managed to finish her last bite of sausage and mushroom pizza when Frank dropped back down into his seat.

"That bathroom is fucking disgusting. I feel like I need a shower now."

She slapped his hand away from where it was reaching for another piece of pizza and dug in her purse for the Purel Bob knew she carried everywhere. "If you touch that pizza, I will kill you."

"I washed my hands!"

"But then you touched the door handle." Jamia squirted some of the gel into his hands and dropped the bottle back into her purse. "Now you can eat again."

Bob shook his head and started to shift his leftovers to a takeaway box. "I've got to get back to the shop. Joanne promised to kill me if I left her alone with the kids again."

Jamia flipped her cell phone. "12:39, crap. I've got a meeting at 1 with a sales rep for that new line of Pyrex toys."

Frank shuddered exaggeratedly. "Dude, I don't care how safe they say that shit is, I'm not putting something made of glass up my ass."

Jamia rolled her eyes. "Uh-huh, sure, babe. I'll keep that in mind next time you're begging me to give you a good hard fucking."

 _Awkward_. Bob could feel himself turning bright red. "Um, so... I'd better get going."

Jamia and Frank swiveled their heads towards him in unison and gave him nearly identical, sweet smiles. "Bye, Bob!"

Bob gave them a wave and didn't relax his shoulders until he was out of the restaurant.

Christ.

***

Bowling with Frank was an interesting experience. To be honest, doing anything with Frank was an interesting experience, but bowling especially. He was a bizarre mix of prodigy and menace on the lanes. Bob was never sure if he was going to bowl a turkey or send his ball into the next lane.

The biggest mystery, of course, was how he ended up bowling with Frank in the first place.

He hadn't wanted to like Frank, to become even more enmeshed in his and Jamia's life, but he'd been unable to say no when Frank dragged him out to the monster movie retrospective or to see an absolutely kick-ass little band or to the newest, undoubtedly doomed vegetarian cafe in town.

He genuinely _liked_ the little bastard, god help him, but that didn't mean he didn't want to kill him when he drew his arm back and accidentally sent his bowling ball shooting backwards, narrowly missing shattering Bob's kneecap. "Fucking hell, Frank."

"Oops?" Frank slid over to pick up his slowly spinning ball and didn't even take the time to get into anything resembling the correct bowling form before tossing his ball down the lane. And getting another strike.

Bob sighed and dutifully marked the little box with an 'x'. "You're a freak of nature."

"That's why you love me." Frank executed a neat little twirl and hopped over to smack an obnoxious kiss on his cheek.

Bob was just glad it was warm enough inside the bowling alley to explain the hot flush creeping down up his neck.

***

Over the course of the past few months, Bob had gotten used to Jamia claiming all of his free time as her own. It had started with her tricking him into attending the horrifyingly embarrassing lectures at her shop and slowly grew into a regular schedule of lectures and flea markets and estate sales and, jesus god, performance art.

Sexy performance art.

Bob wasn't sure what he'd done in a past life to deserve this kind of torture, but he hoped whatever it was he had _really_ enjoyed it at the time because he was totally paying for it now. The week after Frank had come home from touring to recharge and work on the new album, Jamia had shown up at the shop and hijacked him, but instead of an estate sale or two dudes humping each other while wrapped in a bridal veil, she brought him to the local community college.

"What are we doing here?"

"We, Robert, are going to learn how to cook." Jamia had a determined look on her face, as if she were preparing to storm Normandy. It was actually a fitting expression; Bob had eaten her cooking before.

"I can cook." Sort of.

"Hamburger Helper doesn't count. We are successful entrepreneurs, Bob. It is time we conducted ourselves like adults." Jamia pulled him into a classroom filled with people milling around a couple dozen kitchen stations. "Besides, all that processed food isn't good for anyone."

Bob knew he shouldn't have mentioned his blood pressure creeping up over the past couple of years.

"It could be worse." Jamia patted his arm comfortingly. "I could have sent you and Frank."

Bob laughed because as bad as Jamia's cooking was, at least she wasn't a danger to herself and others in the kitchen. "Alright, fine. Let's cook."

***

It turned out that while Jamia was a competent enough cook, Bob had both something of a talent for it and, according to the instructor, an unparalleled palate for spices. He'd never bothered to learn the ins and outs of doing anything more complex than reheating, but everything just made sense to him once it was explained. Besides, compared to tatting lace, julienning carrots was a snap. So while Jamia and the rest of the class were struggling through the nuances of homemade tomato sauce, Bob was whipping up a batch of brownies that were both cakey and fudgey with a hint of coffee flavor.

Once everyone in class had a taste, Jamia ate the rest of the pan.

"If I let Frank taste these, he's going to ask you to marry him. It's way too soon for that." Jamia seemed to be completely serious.

Bob wasn't quite sure how to respond to that, so he let it go. "I'm making pie next week."

He could only assume her whimper was at the thought of eating most of a pie.

***

 **Sunday shop hours: 10-4  
8am - 10am: Jamia's adult stitch-n-bitch**

The only rules Bob gave Jamia when she asked if she could do an informal sex talk/stitch-n-bitch every week was that everyone had to be eighteen and his old lady posse could never know what went on while they were at church. Jamia had laughed at him, but agreed to the rules, so Bob let her make fun of him all she wanted.

He always worked on his books Sunday mornings, perched at the counter and doing his best not to listen to the rise and fall of Jamia's voice as she talked about masturbation and G-spots and the multiple uses of a dildo in a loving heterosexual relationship. It wasn't that he was squeamish about the subject or unwilling to voice his opinion when asked directly -- though, _god_ he hated it when someone asked him directly -- it was just that he had a hard enough time keeping secret every impossible thing he wanted from Jamia without giving that part of himself over to her too.

Actually getting to know Frank made everything easier and harder. Suddenly he wasn't Jamia's absentee rockstar boyfriend, but _Frank_ who loved comic books and loud music and his fat dogs. Scandalized gasps pulled Bob from out of his head and he had to roll his eyes at Frank's crazy laugh. He really didn't want to know what Frank had said to get that sort of reaction.

The clock on the corner of his laptop screen flipped over to 9:59 and Bob swore when he realized how much time he'd lost to feeling sorry for himself. He quickly saved what he had managed to get done and had everything shut down by the time Jamia and Frank followed the rest of the crowd up from the back. Once a month, after her stitch-n-bitch, Jamia had to run back to With Bells On to get ready for whichever guest lecturer she'd arranged for the shop. Bob had gotten so used to being dragged over there to help set up chairs and "just be a male presence, Bob, we don't want anyone to feel unwelcome," he automatically followed the two of them through the alley to the back door.

He was fucking shocked at the size of the crowd he could see through the windows, milling around the entrance of With Bells On. There'd never been that many people waiting before and considering it was the week before Christmas, he'd fully expected the crowd to be even smaller than normal. It was also a strange mix of people, more obvious nerds and Renfest extras than the usual crowd of mostly demure suburban wives.

"What the fuck, Jamia?"

She clapped her hands and did a little dance. "It's polyamory day!"

Bob wrinkled his nose at the gathered crowd. "Like what? You're hosting speed dating to find a threesome?"

"No, ass, it's purely academic. There's a presentation and discussion by Vicki Vantoch. I've been trying to get her here since I opened and this was the first time she was able to make it." Jamia unlocked the front door and stepped back to let people begin to file in and find seats.

Bob saw the measuring looks flying around the room and thought Jamia was kidding herself a little.

The lecture was...enlightening. Bob thought he knew what polyamory was, but he thought it was all fun and games -- a hot threesome with your girlfriend and some girl you met at a party or something. Not that people made actual long-standing, committed relationships in threes or fours or even _fives_ , for fuck's sake. He was aware that he was blushing, and he could see Frank watching him if he turned his head a little, and Jamia wasn't even pretending not to stare from where she was sitting behind the cash register.

Bob felt his heart speed up and he concentrated on what the lecturer was saying about trust and communication.

At the break, Frank sneaked up behind him as he was staring at his hands and trying not to think about anything. He pressed the side of his face against Bob's, his skin cool against Bob's burning ear and cheek. Bob thought Frank would make some comment about how red his face had to be, but he didn't say anything. He just stayed there, pressed against Bob for a minute, before brushing his mouth against Bob's hairline and skipping off to lean against Jamia.

Bob took a deep breath, slipping out the front door to hang with the smokers and clear his head. The events of the past couple of months were spinning through his mind and he was starting to think -- no, fuck, that was just impossible. There was no way Jamia and Frank wanted him... like that. For keeps.

No way in hell.

***

 **Monday shop hours: 10-8  
4pm - 7pm: lace tips and tricks**

Bob was twenty-two and two weeks away from finishing his degree in sound engineering when he got the letter from some law firm in Newark telling him he'd been named in his great-aunt's Will. Bob had met his mom's Aunt Rosemarie a grand total of three times, all before he turned fifteen, so he wasn't entirely sure she'd been in her right mind when she made out her Will, but he rearranged his schedule for a couple of days and found a cheap plane ticket up to Jersey to meet with James C. Davidson, attorney-at-law.

When he found out Rosemarie had left him a _yarn store_ \-- a yarn store named Miss KittyKat's Ball of Yarn of all fucking things -- Bob knew she'd been crazy as hell when she made out her Will. Mr. Davidson assured him that the shop was in good hands for the time being while he finished his degree and any decisions about the shop's future could be made once Bob had time to think everything over.

Bob wondered what the hell Mr. Davidson thought he was going to do. It was a yarn shop in Newark, for god's sake. He had a future in the music industry just waiting for him when he graduated.

When the club he'd been planning on running sound for folded the day after graduation, Bob figured it gave him time to go to Jersey to offload Miss KittyKat's Ball of Yarn to some retiree before heading to Chicago to regroup at his mom's place. He hadn't been expecting the "good hands" the shop was in to be those of a half a dozen little old ladies who had loved both Aunt Rosemarie and Miss KittyKat's with the sort of fierce protectiveness Bob associated with mama bears.

Despite that, they hadn't tried to convince him to change his mind when he showed up with his plans to sell; in fact, they all helped him clean and reorganize the entire place while they regaled him with stories about Rosemarie, her eight cats (distributed among the ladies), and all the intricate, fucking intimidating little swatches of knitted shit pinned to nearly every shelf. Patty let him stay in her guest room and all of them took turns feeding him up, very obviously happy to be making food for someone who hadn't enjoyed a home cooked meal in way too long.

He rejected the first offer on the shop because it was an insulting, low-ball offer from someone who had obviously mistaken Bob's youth for naiveté and he was having none of that shit.

He rejected the second because he did his research and knew the real estate developer was just going to raze the entire area and build shitty, over-priced condos.

When he rejected the third for no good reason, Jane sat him down and started to teach him how to knit.

***

"Is that the Laminaria for Brittany's wedding?" Joanne glanced up over the edge of her glasses as she turned her work.

Bob finished the last five stitches before hitting his stitch marker and looking up. "No, I finished that last night and Kathleen is in back blocking it right now."

The thing was, Bob had picked up knitting pretty quickly. Even the most complex pattern seemed to automatically come together in his brain. Once he worked through the beginner problems with tension and dropping stitches unexpectedly, he jumped into lace knitting as a challenge and never looked back. It took a couple of tries to work out all the glitches, but it only took him a couple of months before he was turning out some pretty spectacular lace work. After he made shawls for both Marcy and Sylvia's granddaughter's weddings, word started getting around and he now had a profitable side business knitting up wedding garments for the young and fashionable of New Jersey.

"Did you get a new order? I thought the Laminaria was the only thing you had left to do."

Bob shrugged. "It was. I just needed something to do with my hands."

He totally pretended he couldn't see the look Patty shot around the circle, but couldn't ignore it when she cleared her throat.

"We're worried about you, Bob." She ignored the sharp look he sent her and doggedly continued. "You seem down lately."

"Oh, no. I'm fine. Really." Bob sat up straighter and tried to banish the indelible whatever that was making them think he was depressed. The last time they'd gotten it into their heads that something was wrong with him, he ended up on dates with all of their single grandchildren, nieces, and nephews.

That was two months he never wanted to repeat.

It seemed like Patty was going to ignore his assurance that he was fine, but Jane cleared her throat pointedly and the other woman subsided with nothing more than a grumble. "Are you going to visit your mom for Christmas?"

"No, she and a couple of friends have been saving up all year and are going on a cruise." Bob would miss her, but she was stopping by Newark on her way home to celebrate Christmas and his birthday a little late.

"You're going to be alone on Christmas?" From the amount of scandal in Joanne's voice, Bob was convinced he'd misspoke and said he was going to eat babies for the holidays.

Bob knew a half a dozen invitations to Christmas were in the offing, but luckily he actually had alternate plans. "No, Jamia and Frank are having a thing after they get back from Frank's parents."

"Oh, that's good then." Joanne went back to the infant hat she was working on. "The two of them are quite good friends to you."

"Yeah." Bob forced his flush down by sheer force of will and tried not to think about the hopeful looks the two of them had been shooting him since the polyamory lecture last week. He knew he needed to talk to them both about what the fuck they were thinking about, but there were only a handful of conversations he could imagine being more awkward.

Sylvia sighed and let her knitting drop onto her lap. "That Frank is a little firecracker. He reminds me of my George."

Bob smiled and nodded a couple of times before he remembered. "Wait, isn't your husband named Jack?"

Sylvia's cheeks turned pink. "Yes, well. Jack and I had been married about three years when we met George. He had just come home from a tour in Vietnam and was living in the apartment next to us. He was a lovely young man; so quiet and polite. Well, one thing led to another and--"

"Are you kidding me?" Bob cleared his throat when his voice squeaked.

"Oh, Bob." Sylvia shook her head at him. "You young people always think you're the first to come up with everything."

Patty tutted in an agreeing manner and Bob turned on her. "You knew about this?"

"We all did, dear." Joanne answered for her. "It was sort of hard not to when the three of them went everywhere together for twenty years."

"Twenty years?" Even though that lecturer, Vicki whoever, made it clear that it was possible to have a successful, long-term polyamorous relationship, Bob hadn't really believed her.

"Cancer took George in '88. Agent Orange exposure the VA said." Sylvia played with the locket Bob had never seen her without. "It was quick and a complete shock to me and Jack."

Bob opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before clearing his throat again. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"Thank you, dear." Sylvia smiled and reached over to pat his hand. "You're such a good boy."

Bob smiled absently at her and let their renewed conversation flow around him.

Twenty years.

Huh.

***

 **Tuesday shop hours: 10-8**

It was just past three on Christmas Day when Bob knocked on Jamia and Frank's door. He thought the middle of the afternoon on Christmas Day was a weird time to have a holiday party, but he'd learned pretty fast not to expect anything conventional from Jamia or Frank.

So the light-up Christmas tree sweater and reindeer antlers Frank was wearing when he opened the door were both a surprise and not.

"Merry Christmas, dude!" Frank pulled him into a hug and out of the doorway at the same time. "It's cold as hell out today; get in here."

He let Frank unwind him from his scarf and peel off his hat and jacket while he unlaced his boots and dropped them on the mat just inside the door. Once he was down to his indoor layers, Frank hugged him again, nearly poking his eye out with the antlers. "Come on, Jamia's been missing you."

Part of Bob wanted to protest that it had only been two days since he'd seen the two of them, but his own unhappiness at being away from them the past couple of days kept him quiet on that point. "Merry Christmas to both of you, by the way."

"Bob!" Jamia jumped up and wrapped her arms around his neck. "Merry Christmas."

He hugged her back for a second before setting her back down on her feet. "Where is everyone else?"

"Everyone else?" Jamia asked.

"Uh, yeah -- I thought there were going to be a bunch of people here. I mean, you called it a Christmas _party_..." Bob trailed off.

Frank laughed. "Dude, you're here! That's more than enough party for us."

Jamia coughed and elbowed Frank, muttering something that sounded like "skeevy." Frank widened his eyes innocently, mouthing "What?" silently. Bob snorted at the byplay, even though he was starting to feel a little bit like Little Red Riding Hood at Grandma's House here. He was pretty sure they'd both dance around this thing between them forever unless he gave them an obvious opening.

"So are we going to talk about this or were you two just hoping I'd fall into your bed and stay there?" Or, you know, just said it straight out.

Frank started to say something obviously unhelpful and Jamia covered his mouth with her hand. "Let's get some coffee and cookies and talk, okay?"

Bob saw the way Frank had kissed Jamia's fingers before biting at them playfully and made his decision. He pulled both of them close and brushed a barely there kiss over Jamia's, then Frank's mouth. "Or we could work out the details later."

Frank recovered first, pulling Jamia into a quick kiss before shouting, "Hell yes!" and jumping into Bob's arms.

Bob staggered slightly. Frank was short, yeah, but he was pretty much solid muscle underneath a small layer of pudge. Frank never seemed to take that into consideration when he did his flying squirrel impersonation. "Jesus, Frank."

"Don't break him, baby. I have plans for both of you," Jamia said with a grin that made Bob's cock twitch.

"Mmmmm," Frank said, licking a solid line up the side of Bob's throat. "I like the sound of that," he breathed hotly into Bob's ear. "Jamia has the _best_ plans."

"Oh yeah?" Bob hitched Frank up a little higher and let himself look at Jamia the way he'd wanted to for months. "Someday you're going to have to tell me all of these plans."

Jamia shivered at the tone of his voice and gestured with her head towards the stairs. "Let's take this upstairs. I'm too old to end up having sex on the floor."

Frank turned his attention from sucking an obvious path of hickeys up Bob's neck to Jamia. "If you're too old, Bob is ancient."

Bob rolled his eyes and heaved Frank up and over his shoulder before waving Jamia ahead of him. The stairs heading to the second floor were a little steep, which Bob knew from helping Jamia refinish all the floors in the house, so when Frank squirmed a little too forcefully, he gave him a sharp slap on the ass instead of warning him not to break his fool neck before they even got into the bedroom. When Frank didn't protest the treatment and just ground himself into Bob's shoulder harder, Bob could feel his eyebrows shoot up.

Jamia looked over her shoulder and made ridiculous, Groucho Marx eyebrows at him. "Frank totally likes it a little rough."

Bob couldn't see what Frank was doing with his hands, but he assumed it was a rude gesture judging by Jamia's laugh as she opened the door to the bedroom and skipped through. Bob followed her over to the bed and dumped Frank on it to watch him bounce.

Frank landed sprawled out on the bed, his eyes dark and hooded and his erection making an obvious tent in his jeans. Bob had to take a moment to look at him, because _goddamn_.

"Gorgeous, isn't he?" Jamia said. She pushed at Bob's chest, getting him to sit down on the edge of the bed. Stepping between Bob's spread knees, she rubbed her hands over his short hair and scratched gentle but distinct lines up the back of his neck.

Bob gave in to the impulse he'd been feeling since the very first day he met Jamia and leaned forward, burying his face in her impressive cleavage. He could feel Frank shifting on the bed behind him, so it wasn't a surprise when Frank knelt behind him and said in his ear, "She's got the best fucking boobs in the world. I wanna write songs about them."

Jamia huffed out a giant sigh and it was pretty miraculous from Bob's point of view. "If you ever write a song about my boobs, I will kill you."

"Yeah, yeah." Frank pushed his hands the wrong way through Bob's hair and pulled his head back a few inches before whispering, "Come out of there for a second," and kissing him slowly. It was a gentler kiss than Bob expected, Frank's mouth settling butterfly soft against his for a moment before opening just enough to breathe warm and damp over his lips. Bob only had a moment of the flicker of his tongue before Jamia let loose a huge guffaw of laughter.

"Hey, I'm trying to work here." Frank rested his forehead against Bob's temple and glared at Jamia out of the corner of his eye.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It's just that -- " Jamia waved her hand and choked back another volley of laughter. "You've still got the antlers on."

Bob flicked his eyes up and could just catch the faintest hint of antler in his peripheral vision. "Jesus Christ."

Frank pulled the antlers off and tossed them onto the ground before kneeling back and tugging off the sweater that was still blinking merrily. "Are you happy now?"

Jamia tapped her fingers against her mouth. "Almost."

Bob was unprepared when she knotted her fingers in his shirt and jerked him forward to meet her in the kind of kiss he'd expected from Frank. Jamia kissed like an act of nature -- hard, deep, and overwhelming in its intensity. She buried her fingers in his short hair and tilted his head exactly where she wanted it. Bob could only clutch her ass in his hands and hold on, because she had complete control over the kiss.

It was, hands down, the hottest kiss he'd ever experienced.

He was breathless and blinking stupidly when Jamia released him. She leaned back, using his grip on her ass as a counterbalance, and pulled off her shirt. She was wearing a lacy bra that was just barely doing its job and heard himself made a helpless noise. Frank laughed softly in his ear and said, "I know, right?"

"Get naked, Frank." Jamia stepped back and started to shimmy out of her jeans. "Bob's our present to unwrap this year."

Bob felt Frank flailing behind him on the bed and turned to watch him fling his t-shirt over his shoulder before flopping around, trying to get his jeans off without getting off the bed. Bob rolled his eyes and grabbed the cuffs of his pants and gave a good yank, leaving him in only his boxer briefs. Jamia pressed up against his back and shoved her hands under his layers of shirts and hoodie. He raised his arms and she pulled the whole mess of clothing up and off him, leaving his hair in a staticky halo around his head.

Frank shook his head and knee-walked over to Bob, flattening his hair down and petting his beard once before leaning forward to kiss him again. Bob opened his mouth almost immediately, sliding his tongue against Frank's as two sets of hands got friendly with Bob's back and chest while stripping him of his remaining clothes. He let the hands guide him until he was propped on the pillows mounded at the head of the bed. Frank stretched out on top of him, squirming as he worked his underpants down his legs and kicked them off. As soon as he was completely naked, Frank rolled off Bob, sliding his mouth down his neck and biting a path over his chest.

Frank slowed down once he got to Bob's belly, nipping the crest of Bob's hip and nosing at the join of his hip and leg, drawing the tension out until Bob was almost vibrating with frustration. Jamia lounged next to him on the bed, propped up on one arm, playing with her clit with her free hand while watching Frank not give Bob a blowjob.

"Jesus," Bob gasped as Frank breathed hotly on the head of his cock without touching it. "Stop teasing, you little bastard."

"Uh-uh-uh," Frank singsonged. "What's the magic word?"

"Fellatio?" Bob tried.

Jamia laughed and scooted close enough to kiss Bob again as Frank murmured, "Close enough," and blew a raspberry on his stomach before sucking the head of his dick into his mouth.

Bob made a weird, desperate noise into Jamia's mouth and pushed up against Frank's hold on his hips. Jamia shushed him absently and eeled down the bed to lick at the seam of Frank's mouth for a second. Frank pulled off Bob and kissed Jamia before they engaged in an intense, silent conversation. Bob was about ready to ask for an eyebrow-to-English dictionary when Frank huffed out a sigh and threw himself onto the bed an arm's length from the other two.

"What -- " Bob's question was cut off as Jamia rolled him on top of her so they both were pressed up against Frank.

"Geometry," Jamia said, craning her head up to kiss Bob and then turning her head to the side to kiss Frank. Frank chuckled and lifted his head to kiss Bob, completing the triangle. "Easier to do it this way the first time. We can get more athletic next time. Also, Frank gets off on watching."

Frank said in a put-on haughty voice, "The proper term is _voyeur_." Jamia rolled her eyes and poked a finger at his side. Frank rolled away, giggling, and almost fell off the side of the bed.

"Try not to hurt yourself, babe," Jamia said. Frank gave her a grin and a thumbs up and scooted himself over against Bob's side again.

"Okay, now you've got me where you want me," Bob said, stroking his fingers down Jamia's back. "What're you gonna do with me?"

"Mmmm," Jamia said huskily, "I think you should lie back and enjoy yourself." She sat up, straddling Bob, and shifted down so that his cock was just teasing at her cunt.

"Hey." Frank slid his hand up Jamia's stomach and somehow pulled a condom out of her ear. "No glove, no love."

Bob tried to imagine where the hell Frank had stowed the condom, but gave it up when he felt strong hands smoothing the latex onto him. Jamia shifted back as soon as Frank pulled his hands away and sank down on Bob.

"Oh, fuck."

Jamia half-laughed, half-groaned in response and circled her hips in a dirty little movement that had Bob clutching for whatever skin he could reach, already way more desperate than he should have been. He ended up with one hand on Jamia's thigh and one wrapped in Frank's hair, pulling him in until he was pressed all along Bob's side. Jamia set a hard rhythm, obviously feeling the same urgency that he did. Frank rubbed himself against the ladder of Bob's ribs, craning up to press messy kisses to his mouth and run his hand over Bob's chest and Jamia's stomach.

Frank came first, surprisingly. He dropped his head down to rest on Bob's shoulder and pressed himself, hard, against Bob's side. He went limp with a choked of moan, completely ignoring the slickness he was lying in. Bob set his jaw against the lure to follow Frank into oblivion and slid his hand down Jamia's hip to let his fingers ghost hers as she brought herself off.

Bob held off as long as he could, but he was only human. Between Frank's languid heat pressed along his side and the way Jamia was dissolving by inches above him, Bob came hard, shivering under his skin just enough to make the others hold him that much tighter.

They stayed pressed together like that until Frank started to squirm restlessly. Jamia lazily slapped at his shoulder until he lifted his head from Bob's shoulder to snap, "Jesus, woman. What?"

"If you're not going to fully take advantage of the afterglow, go get us a washcloth or something." Jamia snuggled back down into Bob as Frank rolled out of bed, naked and grumbling and scratching at his side. He was compact and tattooed and completely ridiculous. Bob couldn't take his eyes off him until he disappeared around the corner. He flushed an even darker shade of red when he realized Jamia was smiling fondly at him, watching as he watched Frank. "He can talk about my boobs all he wants; he's got the best ass ever."

Bob laughed and pulled Jamia down into a kiss, only letting her up when a damp cloth draped over their heads and Frank wormed between the two of them, giggling and yelling, "Christmas snuggles!"

Later, tucked into a nest of bedding and warm limbs, with Frank snoring against his chest and Jamia scratching her fingers through his hair, Bob mused that he'd be happy doing exactly this every night of the rest of his life. And he sent a quick thought of thanks to his crazy Aunt Rosemarie, without whom none of this would have happened.

He thought she'd be pretty pleased.


End file.
